A couple of cool things have come along this week.

First off, Just when I had given up on the interviews for the year, 3 come along in the space of a day or two. Most places don’t do hiring during the Christmas season, so I had prepared to hunker down, and wait it out until January. But, out of the blue, 3 very cool opportunities came up. We’ll see how they pan out.

Second, was the recovery of my lost and lonely flash drive. About a month and a half ago, I was at Kinkos, getting some prints made. I left the store, but forgot to get my flash drive from the comp I was using. When i went back later, the people there said it hadn’t been turned in.

Then, out of the clear blue sky of late November, I get a call from ORLANDO, FL! Some lady was in town, and she had stopped by the Windy Hills Kinkos, made some copies, and picked up the wrong flash drive. She didn’t realize the mistake until just this week, but she’s going to send me my shiny cruzer micro back to me this week. I’m glad I had a copy of my resume on there, otherwise, she may never have found me.

Good week, all around.

It all started out innocently enough.

Me and a receptionist in a small lobby. There is a table, 3 charis, and a faux plant. She hands me some paper work to fill out. I reach for my pen.

With the forms signed, and the information given over, I am led into a room with 3 desks.

There’s going to be a Test. I see that clearly now. I have no way to avoid it. I if run, then I may never get this chance again. Too deep to back out now. I steel my self for the inevitable. For the Test.

It was conceived first by a group of NASA engineers. They were working late at the Jet Prooulsion Lab outside of San Francisco, when the idea struck them: Create a test so diabolically hard, yet so seemingly benign as to trick unwary job applicants into giving over their sanity. The concept was brilliance in pure liquid form. The execution, however proved to be more, problematic.

The fist sign of the troubles to come occurred on a Wednesday. Tim, an intern new to the JPL, was working on the Test. He didn’t read the instructions. And the Test not only knew that, it was glad. The Test was a hungry. It wanted to feed.

Half way through his first session, Tim used a keyboard shortcut. The test doesn’t allow for keyboard shortcuts. The trap had been sprung, and Tim was already caught, and he didn’t even know.

You see, the Test isn’t just a simple evaluation. It is all that is wrong with modern office design. The Test makes it OK for people to use idiotic PowerPoint templates. It fuels the desire to add clickable icons that play music in the background. It fans the flames of fly-in text. It uses standard clip art.

I speak of the test because I know that I am in it’s grip. I could feel the jaws of the mighty beast slowly closing around me as I worked through the pseudo interface. I know what I am becoming, and I can do little to slow it’s progress. To say nothing of halting it. The PowerPoint Skills Evaluation Test has me. Soon, I’ll want my animated dog-wagging-its-tail GIF imported and flying around the screen in a spiral motion. I’ll use white Arial on pale yellow backgrounds with a green drop shadow. I’ll cut and paste entire articles from Wikipedia into a single slide. It has taken me. I can not fight it.

Woe to you, Job Seeker. Be mindful of the PowerPoint Test. It knows when you are weak. It knows that you are unaware of the animation options. It will stalk you and hunt you until you are unable or unwilling to put up any resistance.

It sees.

It knows.

It hungers.

I’m looking for a job. Most people know that, but 1 of might not, and since there’s a readership of about 9 people on this blog, that’s 10% of my readership that was uninformed. I just couldn’t have that, now could I? Read the rest of this entry »